Thursday, January 14, 2016

It was the last day of the Mo Willems exhibit at THE HIGH and so despite my reduced lung capacity and general malaise we drug the troops to midtown for an excursion this weekend.

I think as an author you've really done something right when children actively crack up at your stories. We don't actually own any of these books at our house, but they've been a mainstay coming home from the library since even when Louis was little.

Sometimes people wonder how we take two severely autistic kids to an art museum?

First of all it helps to do something kid friendly where they can touch things. A whole day of NO TOUCH isn't good. Also - letting them lick the walls is one of those battles I don't much fight. I would rather they not lick the walls - but knowing WHICH walls it matters about is really the key. yes, part of my parenting skillset is knowing which walls to allow for licking.

My main reason for taking my children so often to places like this though is that I want them to be crammed full of experience. I want them, even Miles and Charlie, to have a wealth of amazing memories to pull from - and I want them to include not just the positive emotions of love, security, self worth, but experiences that aren't every day.

Such as, remember the time we sat and had a snuggle next to the Rubens?

And look here is a dress that was worn by a REAL princess.

And this lady? She was a queen! She was the third wife of Henry the VIII (Divorced Beheaded DIED - she's that one, Jane Seymour).

And it's true Miles and Charlie don't always take away the finer points of what we're doing or seeing but that's ok.

Sometimes for the sake of their attention span, especially in a bigger exhibit, we split the place up and find a place to sit and hang out with them, and take turns viewing the items. They usually don't mind. They thought it was fun to look at some of the things but the finery of the Hapsburgs wasn't really on their list of cool stuff to learn about, so we found a sofa in an alcove.

Two of my favorite pieces were this sorbet dish - just take the one with your portrait engraved on it!

..and this sleigh....dashing through the snow....

It was a really big exhibit but the twins did great, especially with some chill out time in the alcove, and Julia & Louis loved it a lot. Louis wasn't interested and then he got inside and was amazed.

I have dreams, you know. I'm just lucky that mine walk around with me every day.Tweet